


summertime sting

by ohtempora



Category: Baseball RPF
Genre: Hand Jobs, M/M, Semi-Public Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2020-06-29 23:28:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19840765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohtempora/pseuds/ohtempora
Summary: Chris gets hit by a pitch at the top of the eighth and still comes out for the bottom of the inning, saves a run with a diving stop before his hand swells up too much to hold the ball. Cody watches him disappear into the ancient bowels of Fenway Park for preliminary X-rays.It sounded bad.





	summertime sting

**Author's Note:**

> I'M SAD 
> 
> tysm to ewidentnie for looking this over!!

They win the game in extras.

Chris gets hit by a pitch at the top of the eighth and still comes out for the bottom of the inning, saves a run with a diving stop before his hand swells up too much to hold the ball. Cody watches him disappear into the ancient bowels of Fenway Park for preliminary X-rays. It looked bad. It sounded bad. He reappears when everything is over but media availability, arm wrapped, holding ice to it with his non-injured hand. He winces through talking to the press, flinches through getting dressed. He takes twice as long as he should to tie his shoes. Enough of the team notices how slow he’s moving that Russ heads over to Chris's stall, has a firm, quiet word with him, and then hefts Chris's bag over his shoulder and carries it out to the bus. 

Cody walks a step behind them the whole way, doesn't say anything. 

The bus is late-night silent as they wind through city streets, then sleepily board the charter at Logan. The only sound on the plane is the steady hum of the engines. Cody situates himself in the row next to Chris and watches the lights of Boston fade in the distance as they take off, wrapping himself in a blanket. The team sent Kersh ahead once the game began to stretch out, saving them from his snoring, but Austin and Pedro are more than making up for it. He pulls down the window shade and tries to close his eyes. They’ll only be in the air for an hour or so. It shouldn't be that bad. 

Kenley is snoring too. 

Cody reaches for his headphones, buried deep in his hoodie pocket, then looks across the aisle. Someone gave Chris a soft brace for his wrist. He looks hazy, pain creeping in at the edges of his face. Surely they gave him something to dull the ache, too, but it wasn't enough. Cody knows him well; Cody can tell. 

He gets up and moves over, trailing his blanket and headphone cords, then settles in next to Chris. 

Chris says, "I'm fine."

Cody throws the blanket over both of them, touches their knees together underneath the fabric.

"They're gonna look at it tomorrow," Chris says. "They hope — a deep bruise. You know." He holds up his arm. “This is just for stability.”

"That was a good catch," Cody says. "Like, when you came back out."

"Adrenaline," Chris says, which means it really started hurting after, past the point of forced ignorance. Cody looks at the flat press of his lips, the tension under his eyes, and curves his hand around Chris's thigh. He feels Chris stiffen under his touch, then minutely relax.

"I hate flights this late," Cody says."I never fucking fall asleep. And then by the time I do we're always landing."

"Yeah," Chris says, and Cody takes the risk, leans into Chris's non-injured side. The plane is over-air-conditioned and Chris is warm, solidly familiar against him. Cody breathes in and out and waits for Chris to tell him to move.

He doesn't, another sign of how much he's hurting. They're so careful, always mindful of who’s around. They've managed to get away with living together for over a year, ever since the two of them became serious, and it sucks. Cody kind of wants to kiss Chris on the top of the head and tell him it'll all be okay. He can't do that here, can’t do that yet. Chris won't believe him, but that isn't what's important. 

"At least it isn't your throwing arm," Cody says. 

Chris doesn't have to say anything. He raises one eyebrow, and Cody says, "Okay, yeah, I won't."

Maybe he'll sneak into Chris's room once room assignments are handed out. Well -- he doesn't have to sneak, not after Justin caught him skulking across the hotel hall last year. Cody fumbled his way through an excuse about some video game competition they'd started at home and how his honor was at stake, instead of the truth, which was that he was going to get on his knees for Chris in the big square hotel shower, and he'd been thinking about it every time he was alone out in right field.

"You should get something from the trainer to sleep, maybe," Cody tries. "I can ask if you want. I think they’re all sitting up by Doc."

"If it's a bone bruise I don't need it." 

Cody doesn't know how to describe it — oh, injury frustration, sure, they've all felt it. It's part of being a ballplayer. You let it build up so you can ignore all the hurts that aren't serious enough, use the fear of the injured list to get yourself back out on the field. But no one ever told him how he'd feel it for someone else. 

Philly. He tries to think about the game. Team is on a skid right now, so even landing past 4 am, the Dodgers have rested pitching, they'll have a shot. He looked at the scouting reports for Elfin earlier. No reason they can't take the series. Kiké can fill in for Chris, plus Beaty is coming back up from OKC for the outfield. They're all used to the position shuffle that comes with being part of this team.

"Cody," Chris says.

"What?" Cody twists his head up. "You're not asleep either."

"I doubt I'm playing tomorrow no matter what the X-ray says." 

"The locker room will have Red Bull or coffee or whatever, I'll be fine." He doesn't jinx it by hoping for no extras tomorrow either. They'll just have to try their best and all that dumb bullshit, and not voice any hopes for the length of the game aloud. 

He has a weird, sharp flashback to the first time they slept together. It wasn't long after they met, Chris newly traded from Seattle and Cody called up from double-A. The air was thick with summer heat like it was at gametime tonight. Less humidity, maybe. Oklahoma City wasn't quite as bad as Boston. They'd been on some endless bus ride where the scenery had stopped being interesting several fields ago, and the air conditioning was just bad enough that everyone was covered in a fine sheen of sweat. He'd sat next to Chris, both of them with their headphones in, bare knees touching. During turns on the highway they fell further into each other, so many opportunities to shift back to normal. They didn't.

Then they got to their destination, somewhere in Texas, and they jerked each other off on top of the plasticky hotel comforters with wide eyes, knowing this was something they could never, ever let leave the minors. 

Cody looks back at the straight slope of Chris's nose and wriggles closer under the blanket, slides his hand all the way up Chris's thigh. He's wearing loose grey sweatpants emblazoned with the Dodgers logo, but then again it’s getaway day, they all are. 

"Cody," Chris says again. 

"You'll feel better," Cody says, irrefutable fact coloring his tone. "I can't — do anything else, right, so — just let me. Everyone's asleep."

"Kenta's awake."

"He's three rows up and he's watching Japanese reality TV." Cody shrugs and goes for Chris's waistband. "I wanna help." He waits a minute, until Chris stops tensing up so bad and his thighs inch open. "Also, if your wrist is broken, how are you gonna jerk off? Ever think about that?"

"I have two fucking hands," Chris says, but he sighs when Cody wraps a hand around his dick, catches his lower lip between his teeth to hold back any sound. 

The engine hum is loud enough that no one looks over at them, but Cody still knows they're getting away with this, same as they've gotten away with everything else between the two of them since the end of 2016. He pauses and brings his hand to his mouth so he can lick his palm, ease the slide of his hand over Chris’s skin. Chris relaxes into the touch when Cody worms his hand back under the blanket, his eyes fluttering shut. 

Cody watches him for a while, hand working, then tucks his face against Chris's neck, Chris's beard tickling his forehead. Too intimate for the plane, but it's fine, it won’t be much longer. He can tell Chris is close, hips jerking up into his touch, dick wet with precome. Cody keeps the rhythm steady and presses an open-mouth kiss to his throat, feels rather than sees Chris come, spreading wetness over his palm.

He didn't think this through. He should have grabbed a napkin before he crossed the aisle. 

Chris watches him through lidded eyes as Cody pulls his hand out and considers his next step. He doesn't want to stain his joggers and it’d be rude as fuck to wipe it on Chris’s shirt — he shrugs licks his hand clean, then swallows before rooting around in Chris's carryon bag for a bottle of water.

"Jesus, dude," Chris says, exhaustion drawing out his vowels when he speaks. "You didn't have to do that."

Cody says, "It's fine," and yanks the blanket back over them both. He thinks he can see New York out the plane window. Who the fuck knows. It's 3 in the morning. It's probably not New York. If he was looking in the daylight he bets he’d know it was Jersey. "If you wanna sleep on my shoulder, that's okay." 

He watches until Chris closes his eyes, waits until his breathing evens out. 

They land in Philadelphia after 4 AM, the entire team stumbling off the plane in various stages of half-awake. No one spares them a second glance, except Ryu when Cody accidentally knocks into him, and even then it's tempered by a yawn. He sleeps in his own hotel room, not wanting to push it, and in the morning it turns out Chris's forearm is fractured, out 4 to 6 weeks.

"I'm sorry," Cody says, the words falling uselessly to the ground between them. There's a new brace on Chris's arm but he wants to reach out and look at the bruised skin himself, touch it carefully, just in case there's something the training staff missed. "When we get back to LA I'll drive you home. Or maybe someone we know can throw at the Sox in interleague play—"

Chris laughs, and sighs, and pulls him around the corner so they can touch for real, careful, just like they always are. 

**Author's Note:**

> > The Dodgers landed in Philadelphia at 4:11 a.m. today, then pounded the Phillies 15 hours later. They played through fatigue. “I mean,” Cody Bellinger said, “I drank two Red Bulls and took a lot of Advil, so I was feeling all right.”
> 
> ([source](https://twitter.com/pedromoura/status/1150964943786795008))


End file.
